Discussion Continuous monitoring of business process controls: A pilot implementation of a continuous auditing system at Siemens by Alles, Brennan, Kogan and Vasarhelyi Discussant's comments S. Michael Groomer ⁎ Department of Accounting, Kelly School of Business, Indiana University, Bloomington, IN 47405-1701, USA Received 14 November 2005; received in revised form 14 March 2006; accepted 16 March 2006 1. Introduction The Continuous Auditing (CA) subject matter has been in the accounting and auditing literature for at least the last 30 years. Weber (1982) notes three major concurrent auditing techniques, namely, (1) Integrated Test Facility (ITF), (2) Snapshop/extended record and (3) the System Control Audit Review File (SCARF). The SCARF technique is analogous to the present- day concept of Embedded Audit Modules (EAMs). EAMs are the predominant computer audit technique for facilitating continuous auditing. While not intended to be exhaustive, early publication regarding continuous auditing can be found in a number of articles and books. These publications include Perry (1974a,b), Mair et al. (1976), Porter and Perry (1981), Koch (1981, 1984), Weber (1982), and Skudrna and Lackner (1981). 1 The works of Groomer and Murthy (1989) and subsequently Vasarhelyi and Halper (1991) are the earliest of the “current day works” on this subject that set out to demonstrate how continuous auditing could become a reality. As a sometimes contributor to the literature in this area, I am delighted that the research involving continuous auditing is moving beyond the discussion and model-building phase to the development of a pilot implementation in a significant client setting. The work of Alles, Brennan, Kogan and Vasarhelyi clearly pushes the envelope for what we know about what works and what International Journal of Accounting Information Systems 7 (2006) 162 – 166 ⁎ Tel.: +1 812 855 4026. E-mail address: groomer@indiana.edu. 1 It is likely that Continuous Auditing was first considered as a computer audit technique by personnel at Touche Ross & Co. 1467-0895/$ - see front matter © 2006 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.accinf.2006.03.005